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Please advise this move..

First off, please understand I know very little about hardware, servers, and server administration.

I moved from a VPS with dreamhost to my own dedicated server 3 years ago. I've thus been with ServerMatrix (ThePlanet) for 3 years.

I've had the Super Celeron 2.4 package the entire time. However, I am finally starting to push the limits of the server, and want to upgrade now while I still have time and can arrange things better (as opposed to a last-minute emergency upgrade).

So I looked at ThePlanet's Super Xeon package, and fired off a support ticket to them asking how much it'd be to get them to move/transfer my server configuration and files to an upgraded server.

You see, my server is very custom-built - my friend helped me (well he did virtually all of it) set it up from scratch, and we didn't have CPanel so everything was done via SSH/console; later he had installed Webmin, but that is like comparing a Pinto to a Porsche.

We've managed to run this server this way for 3 years decently well - however, it makes transfering it much more difficult (I presume) as it's very custom built and doesn't have CPanel installed.

It is of the utmost importance that my server is transferred/upgraded without any problems. I have 20 sites on my server as it is and I really cannot afford any problems. I'm prepared to accept a minimal downtime of 24 hours or so even though that will really hurt, as long as everything is working perfectly as it was before.

So I ask ThePlanet if they could do this for me. I mention how I'm a 3-year member and have recommended them to my friends, and that I'm now upgrading no less and if they could cut me a break on what it would cost to do this, as I knew that their server admin time was not cheap.

Their reply?:

Thank you for contacting us. We would love to help you with your new server order. The Planet is not able to help you migrate data from one server to another though. If you need configuration work done, we would be happy to help you for administrative time billed at $150 per hour.

$150 an hour? And to a long-time customer noless! And there's no saying how long they will take. Maybe they'll take 10 hours.. that's $1150! Hey, I'm not rich here...

So, I therefore ask you guys, what should I do? I'm considering going to another company and getting somebody to 'somehow' transfer my old server to my new and then when that's done, leaving ThePlanet.

Or I'll maybe just purchase another Super Celeron 2.4 at ThePlanet and use it for MySQL and Mail, as my friend suggested. That would make transferring things a bit easier; although not all that easy as we'd have to hand change all the gazillions of scripts to point MySQL to the new server.

Couldn't you just tar up all the files you want transferred on the old server...then when you get the new server...copy the tar'ed files to the new server and unzip them into the proper directories, etc?

$150/hour is decent amount of money if the hours start to add up.

If you want a good company that can help you as an alternative to TP, PM me and I will give you their contact information or just visit the link in my sig and go to the contact page. I'm sure they can help you for less than $150/hour.

I could easily be wrong, but I don't think it's that simple.. we basically have custom built configurations of everything - Apache, MySQL, Sendmail, Perl, PHP, etc. There's just so many factors and things to consider that it's really worrying me to death...

So I updated the support ticket asking them roughly how long they thought it'd take, so I could see if I could afford the $150/hour. This is their response:

Hello,

How long it would take a technician to move the data from one machine to another is not something that we can quote you on. I am sorry that we can not do anything with your data for you. However, I am sure that you can understand the liability in doing so, and the reasons for our policies.

However, there may be a simple solution of ordering a NAS backup account to help you with this transition in addition to backups. NAS accounts can be shared between several different servers. Since you will have your current server up you will be able to make a complete backup on your NAS account, and do a complete restore on the new server once it is up. This will only take the time that it physically takes to FTP from one device to another.

Costs on NAS accounts are as follows:

NAS 10GB + $10/MO

NAS 20GB + $20/MO

NAS 40GB + $40/MO

NAS 80GB + $60/MO

NAS 120GB + $80/MO

NAS 200GB + $120/MO

Please let me know if this solution works for you, and which of these you would like to proceed with.

Maybe if the NAs can be configured to backup all of your custom configurations. That might work.

Is there a reason you want to upgrade to a xeon? Most motherboards that support celeron processors also support pentium 4 processors so would that be an option for you? All they would need to do is simply put in a P4 processor instead of a celeron and everything will work fine.

Tyler, I'm checking prices with my preferred hosting company - they have more clue than any other hosting company I've dealt with. Given the service I received, I can recommend them wholeheartedly. I'll send you a PM, to get more of your needs.

BP

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What's the word on your hosting situation? Staying with theplanet or moving on to someone else? I'm quite interested to see where you go. Be sure to let us know how it all works out for you!

Btw, on your Super Celeron 2.4 package did you opt for the RAID1 (2x200GB) or do you skip and go with one drive (eeek!)? I don't see any mention of backups as part of their 'standard' package either. How much of a premium do they charge for backups?